Richard Sprague's Future Blog

Cheap Gas

2008-11-10T16:21:00.001-08:00

What’s going on with gas prices? Look what I just paid at a 76 station right off the freeway near Ellensburg:

(That’s a ‘1’ at the beginning of the price, not a ‘2’)

Purple toes in Zillah

2008-11-10T05:45:00.001-08:00

There are no wine lovers in the San Francisco Bay Area (or in Seattle for that matter) who haven’t been to Napa Valley. But comparatively few people know about a similar wine-growing region just two hours east of Mercer Island (over the soon-to-be-tolled I-90 bridge), in the Rattlesnake Hills area of the Yakima Valley. We spent our weekend there, where some good friends are getting started with their own winery.

First, we picked some grapes:

then we crushed them:

and now look at the toes on my 6-year-old:

You should go too! Best place to stay in Zillah is the Comfort Inn, for about $100/night, including a big breakfast, a pool, and free use of their grill!

Worst President Ever

2008-11-05T05:52:00.000-08:00

I'm a big fan of Black Swan theory, which says that although leaders are measured by the Big Things that happen, they are rarely given credit for policies or actions that prevent Big Things from happening in the first place. Since it's impossible to wind back the clock and do the redo the experiment, we are left victims of the narrative fallacy, our desperate need to explain everything even when the real cause is unknowable, and to assign credit or blame to people (like the President) who have very little real influence compared to the collective, independent actions of the rest of us.

Think how history would look back on the past eight years if we had a President who had done this:

Instead of focusing on the economy, he wasted his first year in office on a quixotic push to pass intrusive Homeland Security laws like the one forcing airlines to put locks on cockpit doors. Experts agree this had no effect on safety, as shown by the complete lack of hijackings since.
Second year in office, he forced burdensome new regulations on business transparency that devastated many innocent companies, forcing needless management changes at great American companies like Enron, Worldcom, Tyco, and others. It’s a miracle these companies still exist.
Iraq War: rather than leave the task to international inspectors, he wasted a trillion dollars removing a dictator who experts agree presented no serious long-term threat.
New Orleans levee protection: in a blatantly corrupt attempt to reward his cronies and win votes, he poured excessive federal money into a crash program to over-build flood levees when it’s now obvious that even during a large storm like Hurricane Katrina, the original levees would have held just fine.
Millions of poor families remain stuck in rental housing because of his refusal to continue the wise policies of the 1990s that offered a chance at home ownership to everyone. The economy is now paying the price, with stalled housing values and a stock market that barely rises past the inflation rate.

Nobody, not even the wisest expert out there, can predict the Biggest Thing that will happen to the next President. But any pre-emptive thing he does will be judged unkindly by history precisely because the Biggest Disaster he prevents is the one that never happens.

Free coffee at Starbucks

2008-11-04T08:17:00.001-08:00

I dropped in on West Mercer Elementary school this morning:

and then I went downtown and got one of these for free:

Incidentally, I disagree with the idea that irresponsible or uninformed people should vote. If you’re unsure about a candidate or an issue, please don’t guess – you’ll likely just make things worse.

If you want to know what I think about issues, read these posts. If I’m wrong about something, please leave comments so I can change my mind.

Sign Waving to Commuters

2008-11-03T09:18:00.001-08:00

If you want to say something to Mercer Islanders, you can’t beat the intersection of Island Crest Way and 40th as a place to publicize your message. A large percentage of the island drives past it every morning, and they’re your captive audience until the light turns green. There must be an election or something this week, because here’s what we had this morning:

Can you spot the three City Council members in these photos?

I wonder how crowded it’ll be tomorrow morning?

Litzow vs. Maxwell at the PTA

2008-11-02T17:26:00.000-08:00

The Mercer Island Legislative Team of the PTA sponsored a discussion recently between the Washington State 41st district legislative candidates, Democrat Marcie Maxwell and Republican Steve Litzow. It’s getting close to Election Day and maybe with absentee ballots the decision has already been made. But if like me you’re planning to vote in person on Tuesday, here’s my bottom line on the differences between the candidates:

Steve cares most about freedom: let schools, teachers, parents, and taxpayers have maximum choice and flexibility. Marcie cares most about fairness: don’t let the “rich” districts (like Mercer Island) forget that there are less well-off places in need. Marcie knows more details about education issues, but Steve is less beholden to vested interests and more likely to bring real change – if you think that’s necessary.

The best example of this difference is school funding. Mercer Islanders would spend even more on our schools if we could, but Washington is one of only two states that put a maximum cap on the amount you can raise in tax levies – even if 100% of the voters in a district beg for it. How silly is that?

Steve: would eliminate the levy lid if he could, but recognizes it’s politically difficult, so he supports a compromise that involves raising the floor on funds we get from the state.

Marcie: reminds us there are other districts out there that won’t support higher taxes for education the way we do, and it’s important not to let Mercer Island get too far ahead.

In other words, Steve wants people to be free to choose the level of funding they want, but Marcie worries that’ll lead to unfair advantages for the pro-education districts.

One nit: both candidates keep repeating the incorrect statistic that Washington scores 42nd in funding on education. That’s very old data; the actual number is 38th (as of 2006) and probably much higher by now thanks to the $2.46B added to teacher salaries in the past four years .

Both candidates say teacher strikes should be illegal, though neither gives specifics on what to do. Steve notes that the unions seem to strike each year just before elections, and that we should expect another one two years from now, just before the next election. No suggestions for how to avoid it. Marcie repeats her union supporters’ statements about how “teachers are happiest in the classroom” and that presumably the best way to ensure happiness is to pay them more.

But how should we pay them? I saw a big, healthy difference:

Steve: “I do believe it’s possible to tell the difference between good teachers and bad teachers” and the good ones should be rewarded.

Marcie: “It’s complicated”, so let’s focus on making existing teachers better, through things like National Board Certification or the Math Academy they tried in the Renton district.

Here Steve’s clearly right. It’s ridiculous that we give the same raises to the worst 10% of teachers that we give to the top 1%. That study people quote about National Board Certification is flawed because it didn’t distinguish between causation and causality: the certification doesn’t change the teacher. Marcie should read up on what Apple’s Steve Jobs says: today’s schools will never really improve until you fix the awful way we hire and compensate teachers. Meanwhile, those mediocre teachers who want to keep their jobs should spend every waking minute of their day trying to ensure Marcie gets elected because she’s unlikely to propose anything new here.

Somebody asked Marcie why schools in her home district of Renton fare so poorly, and she replied with the important reminder that demographics are important: Renton is not like Mercer Island. It’s a much bigger school district (100K students), with 44% of kids on government assisted lunch programs (in one school it’s as high as 73%). Top-down mandates like No Child Left Behind offer little flexibility, which crushes the options for resource-constrained schools.

There is no question that Marcie is more aware of the day-to-day realities of poor districts, and that her legislative priorities are more focused on the immediate needs of the have-nots. That’s why the Mercer Island School Board President says Steve Litzow doesn’t get it. That may very well be true (he definitely doesn’t get it with his lame, idiotic ads implying Marcie doesn’t protect privacy—give me a break), but does it matter who “gets it” or does it matter who’s more effective? Sure, Marcie cares about the poorest kids (so do we all) but an elected official shouldn’t be given an “A” just for effort.

One more thing: everyone blames the rising cost of education on mandates, so one question to ask is where are those mandates coming from, are they really necessary, and who is more likely to reduce them. Marcie mentioned that we should reconsider some of those mandates (she specifically blames No Child Left Behind). Still, it seems to me that most (all?) of the mandates come from the “fairness” people like her, not from the “freedom” people like Steve. I don’t necessarily disagree with Marcie – I mean, I like “fairness” too – but everything in life is a tradeoff and we can’t keep pretending that more funding is the only answer.

As for me, I’m following the lead of Surrounded by Water and voting for Steve. Since I’m also voting for Fred Jarrett, and I know Marcie’s pretty much lockstep with Fred anyway, I think this is the best way to ensure healthy variety and flexibility in state government.

Prius Gas Mileage

2008-11-02T14:06:00.001-08:00

I’m having fun computing the long-term gas mileage for my 2007 Prius Touring Edition. It’s now just under two years old, and here’s the chart for my cumulative performance:

Gas prices (blue line above) have plummeted so much lately that my fill-up last Friday ($2.499) was close to the lowest I’ve paid in two years. The red line shows the most important number: how many miles I can travel on a dollar’s worth of gas. Generally it hovers between 10 and 15 miles—at least double what we get from our other car (Honda Odyssey).

Prius Flat Tire

2008-10-29T20:38:00.001-07:00

Work has kept me so busy lately that I haven’t had time to do much of anything, so imagine my frustration when I heard that tell-tale “pop” noise coming from my rear right tire as I drove down I-405 on my way home late last night. But the car still rode okay, so it wasn’t till I was home that I discovered this tire was not repairable.

Immediately I checked PriusChat and found that the best tire for a Prius is the Nokian WR, which goes for something like $160+ each at places like the Tire Factory in Redmond. Turns out that my Prius Touring Edition has 16” wheels, which are not terribly easy to find in stock in any case. Other people recommended the Michelin Pilot Primacy (also sold at Costco), but at $163 it actually costs about the same as the Nokian and doesn’t get as good gas mileage. Didn’t matter, cuz it wasn’t in stock at the places I called.

Argh. Long story short I ended up going to my favorite tire place, Les Schwab, who sold me the Toyo Proxes T1R, for about $350 for two of them, installed. It’s a sport tire, so supposedly I’ll get better handling, but I really wanted better fuel economy. I guess that’s the down side of the Touring Edition Prius—you end up with sport tires because nobody keeps anything else in stock.

Confidence in Fred Jarrett

2008-10-27T08:45:00.001-07:00

I think there are at least two kinds of politicians: the "populists" and the "wonks". Too many politicians are populists, who treat government like a popularity contest: a grown-up version of the Homecoming King and Queen (come to think of it, a lot of politicians are former homecoming kings).

We need more wonks, which is why I'm voting for Fred Jarrett. Meet him in person like I did this weekend and you'll see why: he is knee-deep in the details about the issues that matter to him (and me): like education and transportation.

Here are a couple of areas where he changed my mind:

Vote no on I-985: I'm partial to cars--it's far and away the most important way people get around, and I disagree with the do-goodies who push ultra-expensive mass transit that won't help a bit. I figured there's enough opposition to I-985 that it won't pass anyway, but I want to send a message that cars are important. Not anymore. Fred thinks it's likely to pass, unfortunately. I agree with him that it would be a disaster (micromanage how traffic lights get synchronized? Puh-lease)
It’s possible to get bad teachers to quit, through policy changes that don’t have to upset their union. Best example: make pensions portable. A lot of middle-aged teachers would love to change jobs but the golden handcuffs of their generous pensions are keeping them there. What if we could make their pensions portable? through defined contribution (like the 401k that I have) or through something else… I think that’s the single best way to improve schools.
Tolling on I-90. Fred’s opponent, Bob Baker, talks like it’s a simple matter of “just say no”, but in fact Bob Baker’s naive stance would make matters far worse for Mercer Island. [this deserves its own post, like the one from Surrounded by Water]

I'm not surprised the non-partisan Municipal League gives Fred the highest rating for our district.

Stop by the Education Funding blog he runs with several other legislators for more wonky details.

Kenmore Airlines to Camp Orkila

2008-10-19T21:08:00.001-07:00

As far as I know there’s no law forcing us to do it, but for some reason it seems like all Mercer Island fathers enroll in the Y-Guides program of the Lake Heights Family YMCA, a highlight of which is when we dutifully schlepp our kids to Camp Orkila, in the San Juan Islands each October. Usually they try to schedule it on a cold and rainy weekend, but this year it was absolutely beautiful.

The fathers in my tribe were too busy at work to take the 4+ hour trip via ferry, so instead we did something different: we flew on the Northwest’s own Kenmore Airlines, which has a fleet of seaplanes that take off from Lake Union. I can’t believe I haven’t done this before! Instead of a long, roundabout drive up I-5 and over a ferry, we were at our destination in only 40 minutes.

The prices are pretty reasonable, considering the time saved. For about $100/person each way, we saved about a day of our weekend in travel time. The plane literally landed us right on the beach of Camp Orkila.

Getting there is half the fun, of course. Nothing like flying around the Space Needle in 9-seater airplane.

I haven’t had this much fun in the air since last year when a friend took us up in his private plane and we flew over Mercer Island.

Seattle Times Endorses Steve Litzow

2008-10-17T20:38:00.001-07:00

The Seattle Times endorsed Steve Litzow in the race for 41st State Legislative District. You have to chuckle at their follow-on comment

His opponent, Democrat Marcie Maxwell, a member of the Renton School Board, is passionate about education but doesn't seem to have an original idea about the topic.

Ouch!

Their rejection stings even more when compared to the kinder comments they made when they passed on Fred Jarrett’s competitor, Bob Baker, who they at least encourage to “stay in local politics”. It’s clear they agree with the Municipal League’s non-partisan assessment that Marcie just isn’t as qualified.

Note how quickly Steve added the Seattle Times endorsement to this brand new campaign video:

Compare it to a similar one released by Marcie’s team a few weeks ago:

I think the Seattle Times assessment is accurate. I don’t know any Democrats who are enthusiastic about Marcie. If you are, and you really think she’d be a better legislator, especially on education issues, please let me know in the comments. Do original ideas matter in this race?

Last day this year for Farmers Market

2008-10-12T17:30:00.001-07:00

The Mercer Island Farmers Market closes for the winter after today, so my six-year-old and I rode our bikes there one last time to stock up on fresh butter from Golden Glen Creamery, just-picked apples from Jones Creek Farms and (my daughter’s favorite) pluots from Tiny’s Organic.

She took the photos this time. Can’t wait till it opens again next Summer.

Flights around the world

2008-10-12T15:08:00.001-07:00

Whenever I’m on a flight, I like to imagine how many people must be in airplanes at the same time all around the world. My favorite flight info site, flightstats.com, has excellent information in real time about everything related to current flights, but what does the world as a whole look like? The answer is in this video, a simulation of all flights worldwide over a 24-hour period.

I love the way you can just watch the traffic spill from east to west as the world wakes up.

[via Air Traffic Worldwide 24HR from kouko a on Vimeo.]

What’s in my genes? Results from 23andme

2008-10-11T08:07:00.001-07:00

My DNA test results arrived much sooner than I expected. They tell you six to eight weeks, but it was more like two or three. The company that I chose for the test, 23andme, recently dropped their price to only $400, making it much more affordable. (By the way, I paid the original $1,000 price, but they generously refunded the difference--a hint that they care about good customer satisfaction).

I hope to post much more about this as I get time to analyze my data, but meanwhile enough customers are out there now that it's possible to get a sense for the direction this technology is headed. Mark Fletcher is an early user who posted his experiences, and there are several others who have even posted their entire results on line. One of my readers suggested I check out Promethease, a Windows/Mac program that will run through your results and tell you everything that's known about your SNPs. Since my test shows 500,000 SNPs, there is a lot to analyze and I'll need as much help as I can get.

So let's open the envelope, please, and tell me the results!

First, no surprises on my ancestry. Although I found out through the $99 Genographic Project's test that my grandmother is likely descended from native Americans, no such traces exist on either my mitochondrial or Y-chromosomal DNA. I am about as pure-blooded a north European as the test shows it is possible to be. For example, here's a distribution of the people who share my haplogroup, H1*, the one I got from my mother.

On my father's side, R1b1c9, the results are similar:

Note that these results are consistent with the very different conclusion from my Indian grandmother, who gave me 1/4th of my overall genes, but not the ones from this test. Remember, my mitochondrial DNA comes exclusively via my mother, just like my Y-chromosome DNA comes exclusively from my father. Since Grandma (a female) had no Y to pass down, my Y comes from my father and grandfather. Similarly, my mitochondrial DNA is 100% from my Lithuanian mother's side (as you can clearly see from the diagrams above). All the more reason to test your own grandparents while they’re still alive.

Okay, so that’s ancestry. What about the rest? 23andme provides some basic analysis on (as of today) about 90 specific genetic conditions, with varying degrees of scientific certainty or idle interest, depending on how well-studied these are.

In my case the following areas turned up good:

Very low chance of Parkinson’s Disease (unlike Google co-founder Sergei Brin)
I have the same mutation as that Jamaican Olympic sprinter!
No Crohn’s, no Celiac, no lupus, no gout.
No male infertility (hmmmm)
Higher odds of living to 100
IQ: breast-feeding would have raised my IQ 4-5 points. (thanks for nothing, Mom)
Heart disease: lower than average risk. (14.5 out of 100 versus 17.7 out of 100 for other white males)
Arthritis: lower than normal (1.1/100 vs. 4.2)
Diabetes: almost no chance whatsoever of getting Type I and lower than normal odds on Type II (13 vs. 21/100)
Lactose tolerance: what do you expect from a farm boy like me?

Biggest worries: [note to insurance companies: please stop reading here]

Stomach cancer: I have a mutation (Rs2294008) that has been shown in Japanese people to correlate with 4x higher rates of diffuse stomach cancer
Age-related macular degeneration: 12.5 out of 100 (vs. 7.7 in other europeans) according to some studies.

There are many more mutations covered by the test, but these are the most relevant to me. As you can see, the results are mixed: some “good” news, some “bad”. But look more closely and you’ll see why I’m not sure yet if this really tells me much. For example, I have a mutation (rs1051730) associated with nicotine dependence. Okay, guess I better not smoke. Same thing goes with similar mutations associated with heroin, HIV, and noroviruses: I’m at risk. Big deal. My mother tells me these things even without viewing my genetic results. Did I pay $400 for this?

Of course, if some of these results had gone the other way – and I’m less susceptible to addiction, HIV, or other preventable conditions – would that make me consider taking up different behaviors? No, of course not. There are lots of good non-genetic reasons to avoid these things.

I also question the reliability of some of the science. For example, one of my mutations is associated with higher-than-normal risk of becoming obese if I eat more than 30% of my calories as fat. That’s absurd to anyone who knows me and my eating habits: I’ve been skinny since childhood, seemingly regardless of what I eat. But if I were overweight, I’d look at the same result with a big “aha” and think I know something revealing about myself.

So my bottom line is that although this is fascinating to somebody like me who is willing to invest the time and skeptical energy to interpreting these results, I’m not sure others will benefit much yet. A cursory glance will tell you a few things, but it will take much work and analysis to uncover whether the results are truly interesting, or whether they merely confirm your own preconceived biases about yourself.

Mercer Island Meetup on Fri Oct 10

2008-10-05T20:31:00.001-07:00

It’s time for us to meet face-to-face. Anyone who reads this blog is welcome to meet me at the Tully’s on the north end of Mercer Island on Friday morning, October 10th. I’ll be there starting at 7:30 or so, staying until we get bored (or have to go to work, whichever comes first).

Everyone is welcome. I look forward to meeting you!

Reichert said no to the bail-out

2008-09-30T05:37:00.001-07:00

Mercer Island’s congressman, Dave Reichert, voted against the $700B bail-out of the financial industry. A bunch of my friends are getting ready to jump out windows over this and I just can’t figure out why. Am I the only one who thinks a spending package this big deserves a lot more debate? By all accounts, the economy is still growing; inflation and unemployment are relatively low, historically. What exactly is the government “rescuing” here in such a hurry?

It’s especially strange to me that many of the same people who opposed the Iraq invasion because it was too rushed (“give the inspectors more time”) are now supporting a hugely expensive bill that was thrown together in a few days, with no time for serious public discussion.

Incidentally, Reichert’s opponent in the election, Darcy Burner, talks against the bail-out as well, though it’s hard to say if she would have bucked her own party leadership to oppose it.

Help me out here. Commentators on both the left and the right are absolutely convinced that Reichert’s refusal to spend $700B is going to lead to another Great Depression, but I just don’t get it. What am I missing?

Updates: Reichert voted against the second version as well, but this time it passed and appears headed into law. I still don’t understand the arguments in favor, but note that many people I respect think it was urgently needed. (See Warren Buffett, Jeremy Siegel, Robert Schiller).

The Battles of Tim Eyman

2008-09-28T18:27:00.001-07:00

Although I first heard about this documentary film back in February, when the director Paul Fraser came to a Global Warming lecture at the Mercer Island library, I didn’t get around to watching it until yesterday, after seeing it mentioned in the paper last week. As you know, I’m a fan of all things local: I think everyone in Washington state, at least anyone interested in state/local politics should watch it too.

Tim Eyman is an activist famous for leading numerous state-wide ballot initiatives (referendums), mostly in the name of lowering taxes and limiting the power of government. His claims to fame are various initiatives over the past ten years that ended up lowering car licensing fees and requiring a 2/3rds majority in state legislature to raise taxes. He says his initiatives have reduced taxes over $11B, but he doesn’t just fight taxes. He also successfully led an effort to reduce the size of the King County City Council, and his organization, Permanent Offense, has fought for various issues related to transportation, including the I-985 (“reduce traffic congestion”) bill that will be on the November 4th ballot.

Although it’s clear the director thinks Eyman is an intriguing, newsworthy guy, this is not a propaganda film, and I find it hard to tell which side he’s on. There are interviews with Eyman himself and supporters like Mercer Island’s Michael Medved who portray him as a “man of the people” trying to “take back the government”. But these are nicely balanced with persuasive arguments for how citizen-led mass referendums can lead to a lack of accountability. The film includes lengthy personal interviews with opponents like State Senator Ken Jacobson (D), radio personality BJ Shea, and even David Goldstein, whose popular far-left blog is actually named after an initiative started expressly to have Tim Eyman declared a Horse’s ass.

The film’s not perfect. I wish there had been more biography for example; I kept hoping there’d be a segment explaining Eyman’s non-activist background (where does he get his money? what’s his day job?) At nearly two hours, I found it a bit long; a tougher editor could have turned this into a shorter made-for-TV film that would be more widely watched – as it deserves.

It’s on Netflix, so put it in your queue right now. Don’t vote in November until you’ve seen it.

Konga at Trabant Coffee

2008-09-28T15:45:00.000-07:00

Mike at Trabant Coffee and Chai saw that I was looking for more Ethiopia Yergcheffe Konga coffee (it’s sooo good!), and let me know that a new batch is now available from 49th Parallel Roasters and it’s in stock now in Seattle. So I rushed over to their Pioneer Square store and picked up a fresh 12-oz bag and this morning I enjoyed another, heavenly-wonderful, handmade raw milk latte with those excellent beans.

I even gave a cup to the piano teacher at our house this afternoon. She’ll be back, I assure you.

Robert Shiller and the Subprime Solution

2008-09-25T22:29:00.001-07:00

With an endorsement from Nassim Taleb on the cover of his new book , and a mention in an excellent Econtalk podcast last week, I just had to go see Robert Shiller talk today about the Subprime Solution.

After running through a list of astonishing events that occurred since publication just one month ago, he spoke about the huge, unusual runup in housing prices over the past decade, how that was completely out of line with historical norms, and why the future doesn’t look good for housing prices (ha!). By the way, did you know that all the home price information for various cities is available as a simple Excel sheet on the Standard and Poor’s web site? (Here’s the info for Seattle)

He has an interesting idea for how to prevent future housing meltdowns. Why do millions of people have such a huge amount of their personal wealth invested in a single asset (their home). Why not create a security that lets homeowners spread or hedge that risk across more diverse assets? He suggests creating mortgage products where the price fluctuates on the underlying value of the home. Presumably this would lower the return on investment, but protect you much better in the case of falling prices.

Interesting ideas…too bad the finance people are too busy to think about this right now.

[update: oops, I spelled Shiller incorrectly with a 'c' in the first version of this post]

Taleb thoughts on the financial crisis

2008-09-25T09:16:00.001-07:00

I already told you that The Black Swan is among the best idea books I have ever read, and I find it even more interesting when I look at the current high-stakes news from the finance industry. Do we need more regulation or less? No bail-out, or one with strings attached—and what kind of strings? Obama or McCain?

All these questions are easier to consider when you understand that too much decision-making is made based on a faulty use of statistics.

Well, the Black Swan author, Nassim Taleb has just written a lengthy, must-read essay “The Fourth Quadrant”, where he argues about the limits of knowledge and how dangerous it is for policymakers (and the rest of us) to think that complex computer models are useful tools for the kinds of large-scale super-complicated decisions that have resulted in today’s mess.

Here’s the chart that explains it best:

This is the life of a turkey, who like many of today’s leaders, uses indisputable statistics and the best and brightest advisors to “prove” that he knows which policies will provide continued growth and happiness for the flock. After all, numbers don’t lie, right? Unfortunately, numbers don’t tell him the most important fact of all, that he is a turkey before Thanksgiving.

This is not an argument for nihilism, that we should just sit around and do nothing. Read Taleb’s essay and understand, on the contrary, that there are things we should do and that we’re much better off when we know what we don’t know.

Comparing teacher experience between Mercer Island and Bellevue

2008-09-20T08:07:00.001-07:00

Good teachers deserve to be paid a lot more than they are, and if it were up to me there’d be a huge bonus pool, with big fat raises for some of the underpaid but outstanding teachers I know. It’s no fair that the bottom 10% get to dictate how the top 10% are paid. In competitive industries (like small business, real estate, restaurants, any international company), your income is based on performance, not years of experience, which is why I I don’t think you should evaluate teachers strictly based on their number of years of experience either. But if you’re curious how school districts compare, this chart should help:

I calculated the number of teachers in Bellevue and Mercer Island who have various numbers of years of experience. In my rush I couldn’t think of a better way to label the graph, but basically each column represents the percentage of teachers whose years of teaching experience are somewhere between the previous column and this one.

For example, 27% of Mercer Island teachers have between 0 and 5 years of experience, while 38% of Bellevue teachers fit that category; 23% of Mercer Island teachers have been on the job between 20 and 30 years while only 11% of Bellevue teachers have.

Generally speaking, Bellevue has fresher teachers than Mercer Island. Since the union-mandated payscale cares only how long somebody has been on the job, no matter what their competency or fitness for teaching, this explains why Mercer Island salaries are slightly higher.

[9/23: I updated this post a bit to explain better what I think]